A time when plates grew on trees

Mary Parmar

GENERATION after generation has been using organic plates grown on trees, mostly found in lower areas of Himachal Pradesh. In Kangra, these ‘plates’ are known as trambel. The leaves of the tree are thick and very broad, nearly a half-plate size. They can be a bit bigger too. These suttun (throwaway) plates are used in villages on many occasions, be it for distributing prasad or on the occasion of family functions when the gathering is too large. Just pluck the leaves, eat from it and throw the plate away, no problem of washing them! These environment-friendly plates from the tree just outside our kitchen would be used for wrapping chappatis instead of the aluminum foil. And they remained fresh and soft, emanating a sweet smell!

For community feasts known as dham, pattal made from tor tree leaves are used. Being a bit smaller than the trambel leaves, these leaves are stitched or pinned together with very small reed stems to get a large plate — biodegradable and hygienic too.

 Similarly, there used to be many other daily-use items in rural homes which are fast vanishing and being replaced with plastic. The big kanal made from mango tree wood to kneed flour, the ropes made from beul tree stems, large containers known as pedu to store grains,  chapatti tokari, large baskets known as dal,   changayer used for drying raw vegetable and fruit products — they were all made from bamboo. Now, the poor, deft dumana, the local artisan who makes these items, is also gradually giving up this trade and the skill is fast disappearing. 

The hill mason rolling out clay brick blocks to make mudhouses with stone slates roofs resting on bamboo beams have also mostly given up this trade. It is, indeed, a comfort to live in these mud and wood intertwined houses which are cool in summer and warm in winter, but sadly they are being replaced with concrete structures that are hot ovens in summer and dead cold in winter. The earthen pots for cooking — handu, dhudunoo for boiling milk, ghada for water, chalehan for skimming milk to get butter, etc. — are no longer in use in rural areas. 

No doubt, it is the plastic age — of plastic smiles, plastic packings, plastic ropes, etc. Further, there is plastic in the stomach of cattle, plastic in the belly of fish, traces of nano plastic particles in our food, plastic in rivers and streams. Plastic is everywhere, even in the deep oceans. So much so, Plastic Free July and International Plastic Bag Free Day are being observed to cleanse the environment of this menace. Coupled with these are pesticides and other dangerous chemicals in our food, drinks and pollution of all kinds in the air and water. Allopathy with its drastic side-effects has taken over ayurveda and naturopathy.

What a scary scenario!  We have moved far away from Mother Nature and her earthly things, and I hear her cry ‘Oh come back, Oh come back, come back my children to me’.